Question: Michael is 4 times as old as Ashley and is also 6 years older than Ashley. How old is Ashley?
Explanation: We can use the given information to write down two equations that describe the ages of Michael and Ashley. Let Michael's current age be $m$ and Ashley's current age be $a$ $m = 4a$ $m = a + 6$ Now we have two independent equations, and we can solve for our two unknowns. Since we are looking for $a$ , and both of our equations have $m$ alone on one side, this is a convenient time to use elimination. Subtracting the second equation from the first equation, we get: $0 =$ $4a$ $-$ $ (a + 6)$ which combines the information about $a$ from both of our original equations. Solving for $a$ , we get: $3 a = 6$ $a = 2$.